Economic and social restructuring processes challenge peripheral rural areas: People search for employment opportunities and therefore often need to move to urban centres. This puts the maintenance of services of general interest at risk. Consequently, the average age of those who stay increases continuously calling for innovative solutions to upkeep the quality of life in rural areas. On the contrary, the most accessible, urban and suburban areas struggle with unsustainable carrying capacities. There, conflicting land use interests, traffic problems and housing shortages affect people's quality of life.

We are conducting applied research on ways to overcome these spatial, environmental and socio-economic challenges. In doing so, our approaches are based on socially innovative, ecologically sound and economically viable solutions. The expertise of our interdisciplinary team is due to numerous insights gained in international projects. We implement them in regional development projects in South Tyrol and other mountain areas. For example, we examine the societal and environmental impacts of transalpine heavy goods vehicles traffic, opportunities for economic diversification and value creation in rural areas, as well as possible forms of coexistence between humans and wild animals.

Our team consists of experts from the economic, geographic, social, cultural, agricultural, natural, traffic, spatial and planning sciences. We are structured in four research groups: ​

Scientific Network - GenericListWebPart

After two successful meetings, CONNECT2CE partners met for the third time in Bolzano. The project aims at tackling the weak accessibility of regional, peripheral and cross-border areas of Central Europe to and from main transport networks and hubs. The meeting also hosted a seminar on South Tyrolean public transport and info-mobility. Visit https://www.interreg-central.eu/Content.Node/CONNECT2CE.html to find out more.